Admittedly most frequently drawn into its dark depths by the promise of the most powerful air-conditioning on campus, some of the movies have been compelling (Maid for Sale), tedious (Basra) or oddly fascinating (Help).

By far the best however, is Pomegranates and Myrrh (Al Mor wa al Rumman), a 2009 Ramallah-based film by Najwa Najjar.

While the official blurb provides an idea of the film’s premise, it utterly fails to do it justice:

Ramallah, this decade. A free spirited woman dancer, Kamar, finds herself the wife of a prisoner, Zaid, and away from everything she loves until she returns to the dance, defying society’s taboos. At the dance, Kamar is confronted with Kais, a Palestinian returnee, who has taken Kamar’s role as the head choreographer. Sparks fly between Kamar and Kais, creating a more than passionate, emotional dance for both of them. Matters become even more complicated when Zaid’s sentence is extended.

To read the above would be to believe that it is a love story between two people (Kamar and Kais), with dance providing the backdrop.

This could not be further from the point, for central to Najjar’s piece is the land – indeed, a love-affair with the land, rather than Kais.

For Zaid, the land is worth more than his family, his wife or even his freedom: when Kamar tearfully pleads with him to sign the document that would allow the confiscation of the olive groves to proceed, but guarantee his freedom, he responds: ‘If the land is gone, then all is lost.’

Kamar’s relationship to the land is intrinsically linked to her own emotions: after the final argument with Zaid in jail, she ploughs the land visciously by hand.

Likewise, she dances her frustrations out on the bare soil of the night orchard, kicking up the dust and stones in feverish whirls.

The men, rather, assume a nominal role in the story.

During the Q&A session Najwa stressed the role of women not only in the movie, but in the making of it, with a number of significant positions being enacted by women.

Moreover, it is the mothers who support and guide Kamar, her sister who prompts her to return to dance and the formidable Umm Habib who provides a ballsy scene of rebuke to the IDF soldiers that raises a thousand goosebumps.

Surprisingly, in addition to these wonderfully profound themes Najjar brings the intifada to our midst in the most powerful manner.

The confiscation scene, the threat of the settlers, the futility of their Israeli lawyer and the endless injustice that is administrative detention is heart-breaking.

Pomegranates and Myrrh is quite possibly the best Palestinian movie in years – which makes it all the more irksome that the only copy on Amazon is a Swedish version.

But, should the lucky opportunity arise, do not miss what will be a truly moving and astounding piece of Middle Eastern contemporary cinema.

By its very virtue, an epiphany is exhilarating, promising and smacking of revelation.

This experience certainly had the latter, though tinged by the accompanying dull thud of the death knell tolling.

For it seems we have lost a crucial component in the pop culture world: the kick-ass, smart-talking and steely eyed woman.

Eclipse director David Slade. And pretty much my stance as the credits rolled.

Admittedly, she has been in decline for a number of years, as a quick read of Sara Crosby’s 2004 article ‘The Cruelest Season: Female Heroes Snapped into Sacrificial Heroines‘ attests.

Ten years on and we have plumbed new depths of female weakness as the film adaptations of Stephenie Meyer’s vampirical saga Twilight bring increasingly more furrowed brows, teary eyes and general limp-wristedness.

Sure, I enjoyed the books – as far as escapism goes the exploits of Bella Swan and her merry band of in-fighting boy toys affords a pleasing jaunt.

The latest adaptation, Eclipse, was too painful by far, however: putting aside that the make-up was diabolical for all the wrong reasons, the utter absence of fangs and a penchant for be-kohled eyebrows with blonde hair, the female characters were more insipid than a de-boned squid.

A brief, if not tormented, recollection raises the following spectres of spinelessness:

Bella, who is trapped in a love triangle that places her life forever at risk; with such odds, one would imagine that a crash course in survival and defence would be in order – not so.

While in the book Bella is instructed by Edward in fighting technique, in the film she merely swings from left to right, arms dangling with all the strength of a damp rag-doll.

Her endless whining that rarely produces a plan, let alone a modicum of intelligence (choice quote: “It’s a bed.” No! Really?!) presents the viewer with a character who not only lacks the physical means to survive, but also a vacuum of acumen.

Alice, supposedly the more insightful of the vampire clan, passes most of the movie wide-eyed, mouth agape or jumping into the arms of her beau, Jasper.

Rosalie, originally fiery and opinionated, is reduced to a cat-faced scowl, moody stalking off stage right and an endless longing for babies.

Esme, the mother figure, mostly stands doe-eyed by her husband and intervenes only to adopt the soon-to-perish vampirelet, Bree Tanner.

Bella’s mother, Renee, dedicates her life to sitting by a pool in a range of head-fancies, sipping pina coladas and talking about her sport coach husband, Phil.

Victoria, the only woman with an iota of physical force, is the malign, manipulative vixen.

Using her red locks and come-hither mewls to captivate and manipulate Riley, the character is merely another femme fatale of the cookie cutter variety.

One could go on, but the general themes can be condensed into three main types: the maternal (Esme, Rosalie), the passive (Bella, Renee, Alice) and the mean (Victoria, Jane).

None of the above are portrayed to excel either intellectually nor physically, while women are to be either tamed or sacrificed.

They neither contradict staunchly, respond savvily nor argue vociferously.

When Jacob kisses Bella by force, her weakness (broken hand after punching him) is rendered the crux of a joke.

Which leaves only one conclusion: the kick-ass chick is dead and the only consolation is that this might one day take place.

“My words seem to me like birds too young and weak to fly far.”

Which is pretty much my sentiment towards my writing after reading the works of Slavenka Drakulić.

It has been oft-noted that books are the ultimate source of escapism: crack one open and you simultaneously open a portal to another world, life or era.

Similarly, close it and so too does the portal close and reality sweep back in.

Not so with Drakulić: her accounts haunt long after, whether pleasant or dark her protagonists niggle as you walk to work, the issues fretfully re-emerging as you eat your lunch.

Seldom has an author evoked the Communist era with such tragic wit and lurid detail; that it touches upon an aspect frequently over-looked – the gender dimension – renders her articles all the more pertinent.

It is the simple things that stand out: the absence of sanitary napkins, paper dolls, the value of a Bazooka Joe bubblegum wrapper and the creativity of women in sustaining beauty regimes in a society in which makeup and hair products were not available:

I understood just how ironic the advice in today’s Cosmopolitan or any other women’s magazine in the West is, advice about so-called ‘natural’ cosmetics, like olive and almond oil, lemon, egg, lavender, camomile, cucumbers, or yogurt. [...] If Western women return to the old recipes, they do so by choice; it is one of many possibilities. Not so for Czech or Bulgarian or Polish women. [...] They worked on construction sites, on highways, in mines, in fields and in factories – the communist ideal was a robust woman who didn’t look much different from a man. A nicely dressed woman was subject to suspicion, sometimes even investigation. [pp. 23-24]

Even during jaunty accounts – such as A Chat with my Censor – an underlying darkness remains denoting that repression does not necessarily exude shady menace; it can resemble “a secondary school teacher” or manifest through the double clicks on your phone-line.

By far the most arresting of the collection, The Day When They Say That War Will Begin is the finest account of war that I have read.

Accounts of war are plentiful in the realms of literature: more often than not they detail the midst of war, the crimes that take place, memories mulled over in the aftermath, and anecdotes gathered.

Drakulić adopts an entirely unique approach by taking the reader to the very moment that war is declared.

The minutiae of daily life rendered unreal the declaration of war on Croatia; the mundanities that continue to mark the minutes as usual, yet Drakulić is unable to fully process the news as her daughter leaves for school nonplussed:

There is no way to protect her from this madness, from the dark molasses of war that is clotting around us, gluing us all together in an immense mass of people where no one can be distinguished anymore. There is no us – me or her – anymore, I thought, giving her a light kiss on the cheek. [p. 175-176]

The smell of freshly baked bread, the voices of locals on the street outside, and the morning mist is sucked into the vacuum of fear:

Fear is like a beast that gnaws at you, eating you up bit by bit, until you totally surrender to its teeth, and you don’t even think that there might still be a chance. [...] I can feel something cold, like a piece of ice, growing inside me, spreading in my chest, drying my mouth, making my palms sweat, making my body shake with illness yet unknown. [...] The fear finally takes over. You can tell it by the way you stay there, in the middle of a room that you don’t recognize anymore, staring into emptiness, paralyzed by a sudden numbness inside you. [p. 177]

There is a tragic beauty to the narrative of Drakulić, one that is by turns formidably strong, yet retains a vulnerability that conveys the gravitas of a particular scenario.

The book concludes with a letter sent by Drakulić to her editor, in lieu of an epilogue.

Compiled in November 1992, the war had already demonstrated its merciless cruelty and Drakulić’s solemn take could just as easily be applied to conflicts past and present:

You do not see the animal that feeds on blood, but you see clearly the seed of division, one single cancer cell from which the war multiplies and grows. Just as the cells in our organism have the ability to change into malign agents that destroy healthy tissue, so, providing that circumstances are right, a certain part of ourselves changes, eats away at our soul. [p. 196]

How We Survived Communism is worthy of reading not just as an account of life under Communism, nor as an insight into a war-torn society; it should be read to understand and appreciate the strength of women.

Drakulić’s contemporaries and protagonists demonstrate that not only are women wells of strength, but that vulnerability and fear is ordinary – it is how we collect ourselves that determines our mettle.

How We Survived Communism and Even Laughed is published by HarperPerennial, 197 pages, 1993. ISBN: 0-06-097540-7.

Thus, armed with as many DVDs as possible, I settled down for a humidity busting break with my new friend the power-fan and the trusty laptop that groaned like a tractor, but pulled through like a trooper.

While the first of the DVDs, Dieu est grand, je suis toute petite [God is Great, I am Not] (2002) was a delightfully frothy and irreverent look at the flippancy with which one can approach faith, Rachida (2002) proved an altogether more poignant affair.

Opening in Algiers in the 1990s, Rachida [Ibtissem Djouadi] is a school teacher who lives with her divorced mother and is contentedly engaged.

On her way to school one morning she is accosted by a gaggle of youths – one of whom is a former pupil – who demand that she take a bomb in a satchel into the school.

Naturally, she refuses and in the midst of the morning market she is shot in the stomach.

Once she awakens she is taken to recuperate in the mountain village in which her colleague has a villa.

As she struggles to readjust to life after the trauma, she is constantly beset by reminders as gunmen run through the village wantonly terrorising the residents and establishing impromptu road blocks.

The climax comes at a wedding and the tragic events that unfold emphasize the pervasiveness of civil war: no where is safe, and noone truly recovers.

As one kid peddling cigarettes wryly observes, “only nightmares are free in this country”.

And after watching Rachida, it was nightmares that I had; there is no gore nor blasts – just the malice of humankind and the constant ominous threat.

For this reason the film was incredible; the closing scene haunts long after the credits role, if not only for Djouadi’s profound performance.

If a book has been featured on Oprah or Richard & Judy, it has received the kiss of death and I gently place it back on the shelf of the store.

This is indubitably incredible snobbery, but there is something so tantalising about a book uncovered lurking in the crevices of a decaying store, and if Amazon doesn’t stock it, it is a real treasure.

Somehow, whether it was a moment of curiosity, or sheer desperation for escapism, I picked up Khaled Hosseini’s acclaimed 2003 tome, The Kite Runner in a local second-hand store.

At the time of the release of the book, and subsequently the movie, a tremendous hype pervaded the media.

With a cocked eyebrow, I entered the book skeptical – I had been stung by the hype-bee through Yann Martel’s Life of Pi, a book so devilish that I actually turned against it.

Having read Hosseini’s work in little over a week, I am eternally grateful to whatever forces prompted me to visit that shop, and grab that book over Orwell’s 1984.

To say it is a masterpiece of story-telling would be mediocre praise.

It is beautiful, tragic, captivating, and most astonishing of all, delightful to finish.

As I approached the final paragraphs, I didn’t put the book aside, sullenly regretting reaching the end so quickly.

Rather, I turned each page with increasing speed; the voice of the main protagonist, Amir, drawing me towards a subtle and sublime conclusion.

After finishing The Kite Runner last night, I mused on which sections I could use as an example of Hosseini’s skillful writing.

I could find none.

I could find none, because the novel is so perfect in its entirety, that it would be churlish and unjust to pluck just one section at random.

It would be akin to taking a brick from the Taj Mahal to present it as an isolated example of the great building itself.

Instead, I shall provide a brief plot outline, and urge you to read the book.

The novel opens in Kabul in the late 1960s, where Amir, a wealthy Pashtun boy, and Hassan, a Hazara and the son of Amir’s father’s servant, Ali, pass their days in a peaceful Kabul, kite fighting and roaming the streets making mischief.

Amir’s father, generally referred to as Baba, loves both the boys, but remains critical of Amir for not being manly enough, as Hassan defends him in every instance.

For his own part, Amir fears his father blames him for his mother’s death during childbirth, and finds a kind father figure in the form of Rahim Khan, Baba’s friend, who is supportive of the young boy’s interest in writing stories.

One day, however, an event occurs that changes the lives of all concerned – Amir and Hassan in particular.

Fast forward, and Amir and Baba flee to America and build a new life in Fremont, California.

Try as he might, Amir cannot outrun his guilt, despite finding success as an author and marrying his “Swap Meet Princess”, Soraya Taheri.

The novel is, then, about redemption, revenge, love, loss, and all the aspects of flawed human lives that render a story so compelling.

Yet Hosseini’s manner of conveying the tale is so matter-of-fact, yet profound, that one becomes almost a confident; the end of the book brings relief, as all is put to right, or as right as it can be.

The beauty of the novel lies in its ability to deliver a heavy subject simply; only on reflection does one realise what a feat that is.

A few months ago I bought Hosseini’s latest tome, A Thousand Splendid Suns; to date, it has been trapped in my mountain of boxes.

After reading The Kite Runner, however, I am struck by the crazed desire to dig it out.

In the meantime, I urge all to beg, borrow, or buy The Kite Runner, for it is a true literary indulgence.

The Kite Runner is published by Bloomsbury Publishing, 352 pages, 2007. ISBN: 0747594880.

While the cover bears the quirkily delightful renderings of Satrapi’s work, the collection of articles compiled by 15 Iranian artists, journalists, authors and filmmakers, provides an alternately humorous, thought-provoking, and insightful account of what Iran means to the writers, and to an extent, the West.

It is a hard task to select a paper that jumps out ahead of its fellows, as Azar Nafisi, Gedareh Asayesh, Satrapi, Reza Aslan, Mehrangiz Kar, Roya Hakakian, Azadeh Moaveni, [deep breath] Naghmeh Zarbafian, Daryush Shayegan, Abbas Kiarostami, Babak Ebrahimian, Negar Azimi, [almost there] Shohreh Aghdashloo and Salar Abdoh, provide a kaleidoscope of challenging and evocative works.

Should I be pressed to select but a few, I would concede that Asayesh’s ‘I Grew Up Thinking I Was White’, Satrapi’s ‘How Can One Be Persian?’, Kar’s ‘Death Of A Mannequin’, and Moaveni’s ‘Sex In The Time Of Mullahs’ held an acerbic wit that causes the article to pass before your eyes at great speed, to be followed by a greedy resentment that the author could not have written slightly more.

Asayesh, author of Saffron Sky, traces the evolution of the concept of race according to the country in which one dwells; almost like a currency, being white affords elevation in some areas, while the definition of being white changes in others:

In Iran, we worship, slogans notwithstanding, the khareji, the outsider. By this word we mean not the Afghans, Arabs, Pakistanis, and Turks who are our neighbors but the white Americans and Europeans who have held sway in the region since the Ottoman Empire. Growing up, I envied friends who ordered their clothes from the Spiegel catalogue. At school, a classmate with an Irish mother ranked as minor aristocracy. I was jealous when my cousins were sent to school in England. The whole family was agog when Caroline, an American friend, came to stay with us in Tehran. [p. 14]

Most fascinating is Kar’s observation of the social changes during the Iranian Revolution played out on the mannequins of Tehran’s store windows.

At first a point of humor, the mannequins evolved gradually from sprightly femme fatales to shrouded female forms, to mutilated sirens guilty of stirring the loins of the pious men:

The owners of the clothes shops finally came to the conclusion that they might be better off detaching the heads of the mannequins from their bodies altogether. The authorities were claiming that the lips of women were aphrodisiac and their eyes stimulating. The shop owners were confused and did not know what to do to save their businesses from the attacks of the regime. So all of a sudden, they cut the heads off their mannequins. …These beheaded mannequins were left with only a round face made out of cardboard. They had no eyes, no eyebrows, no noses, no mouths. The ideal woman for fundamentalists was a woman who did not have eyes to see, a tongue to speak, and legs to run away. [p. 35]

The narrative of Kar is sublime: her words lead you by the hand through the confounding changes that unfold so slowly, that the reader feels the shock of the change with each turn of the page.

It is beautifully horrific.

Satrapi, in my opinion at least, can do no wrong, and in this instance does not fail to impress.

Responding to the seemingly simple question of ‘How Can One Be Persian?’, the author of Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood, navigates the definition of the terms ‘Iranian’ and ‘Persian’ with cynicism and vivacity, concluding that: “Iran has extremists, for sure. Iran has Scheherazade as well. But first and foremost, Iran has an actual identity, an actual history – and above all, actual people, like me.” [p. 23]

Iran is a remarkable place, and as I have posted before, it holds an immense allure and fascination.

Nevertheless, it would be naive to venture that Iran is at all as appreciated – or understood – as well as it deserves to be.

Which is why, for those dipping their toes in the waters of discovering Iran, Zanganeh’s publication provides an excellent introduction and springboard onto the plethora of scintillating and enlightening works currently available.

A final note on the images: by the internationally acclaimed Iranian photographer Shirin Neshat, a few choice works – not including those posted here, except Fervor - feature in the publication, accompanied by her interview, ‘Women Without Men’.

Like the country that inspired the book, Neshat’s photography is the height of elegance, eloquence, and subtle profundity.

My Sister, Guard Your Veil; My Brother, Guard Your Eyes is published by Beacon Press, 132 pages, 2006. ISBN: 0-8070-0463-4.

Still others are meant to be savoured so well that the waiters are in danger of being slapped with a slilver spoon on the forehead if they even attempt to prise the licked plate from your death grip, so good is the meal.

And it is here that The Galley fits as snugly as its quirkily cosy sea-food restaurant, in the Devon town of Topsham.

Tucked away in a corner of the fishing village, itself stowed in the corner of bucolic England, The Galley is more than just a fish’n'chip joint.

It is sea-food culinary at its most stupendously fine.

As an avid sea-food lover I have munched my way around much of the Mediterranean and while the mere thought of Italian calamari still brings a bubble of salivation to my mouth, the dishes crafted by chef Paul Da-Costa-Greaves turn me into a dribbling fool.

Despite the drizzle and gloom, I headed to The Galley yesterday with stout resolution and eager anticipation, though the memory of my last trip had by now become hazy.

I anticipated goodness, but I received heavenliness.

Ordering the Duo Scallops and Prawns, the tagliatelle was cooked to perfection – neither sticky nor gloopy – while the sauce, ah! The sauce was divine.

Ordinarily an utter beast when it comes to eating on an empty stomach, I found myself willing the dish never to end, savouring each burst of taste and every morsel of scallop and prawn.

Using only local produce, the menu is determined by the catches of the day, which means there are no frozen or dodgy looking critters in either the salad nor the shells.

With each chew the scallops released a salty yet juicy taste of the sea, while the sauce complimented it with smatterings of ginger, lemongrass, and a collection of spices and herbs that defied even my food-obsessed imagination.

Accompanied by a side salad worthy of equal attention – combining strawberries, grapes, starfruit, and passion fruit with mixed leaves and a fruity dressing – the meal is not so much an event, as an experience.

Yet it is not the food alone that makes the restaurant: the jovial and cheeky banter maintained by Mark Wright ensures that the meal is as enjoyable socially as it is delicious.

Opening with the cheery words of “Would you like it soft or naughty? [pause for dramatic effect] Your drinks, I mean…” is followed by a singular service facilitated by the diminutive nature of the restaurant.

Equally wonderful is the décor: with murals, paintings, lanterns, and giant dolls in the most unlikely of places, the experience is carried from the table to the hall to the bathroom and the accommodation offered.

In conclusion then, for a sea-food meal that would definitely rest on top of my list of condemned-woman’s-last-meals list, you can do no worse – and possibly no better – than The Galley.

And it never repeats, which always scores bonus points in my book.

While certain tomes lend themselves to worthy remakes – Lord of the Rings, Pride and Prejudice, and under a skillful director, Harry Potter – others doubtless send their authors into spins of fury, as likely did the adaptation of His Dark Materials.

Finding oneself ensconced in a chair while a worthy novel is hacked to pieces by stilted dialogue, watery eyes, and the disposal of scenes that favour subtle nuance over of action/lust is one of my pet hates.

In most cases, however, one is prepared for a massacre of pages through the caustic reviews of the film critics and random pundits.

Nevertheless, in other cases, acting on the unabashed love for a book and whipped into an excited ecstasy by said reviews and punditry, one still meanders into a slight disappointment.

I’m going to be honest now, despite the likelihood that I shall be cast into the pit of eternal social damnation, alongside kitten-kickers, garlic-haters, and people who don’t “get” Monty Python: I did not enjoy Persepolis the movie.

It enthralled me not. It neither eked tears nor raised a raucous belly laugh; nor did it offer cerebral stimulation, or tweak the icy strings of my heart.

The sad part is, I loved, nay, adored the graphic novels – as well as Marjane Satrapi‘s other works – the two volumes of which powered their way into my top five favourite books shortly after page five.

The movie however seemed more a catalogue of scenes as the viewer was yanked from tragedy to humour and back to tragedy, so on and so forth.

The beauty of the tangible Persepolis lay in the scenes that tied the tragic and the humorous together: scenes of domesticity, daily life, social interaction, the nuances that the average viewer may perceive as tedious, or incomprehensible if the book has not been perused.

Therein, then, lies the problem: as the entire graphic novel cannot be rent to screen, sacrifices must be made.

Of course, that is not to say that the movie did not prove profoundly compelling in other respects: Chiara Mastroianni as the voice of the teenage and adult Marji was sublime and exactly as I imagined it would be.

Deliciously husky, petulant, and coy Mastroianni made the movie an additional audio pleasure.

Equally, the scenes in which Marji realises her misconception of Markus, and the tape-vendors, are delightfully witty, while the bombing of Tehran and Marji’s departure are as rending as in the novel.

Admittedly, I am divided in my view of Persepolis as a movie: it was by no means bad, but equally it did not do the graphic novel justice.

Perhaps when a novel is as formidable as the Persepolis volumes, it is too complex a task to adapt it in all its glory, which is why I must conclude that it is purely a worthy and enjoyable jaunt.

Not paying too much attention to the film’s synopsis, I chose Vantage Point largely on the basis of what else was currently playing at our local cinema - the usual serving of one part gore, two parts under-fives, and one part teen-gross out comedy.

From the outset, Vantage Point displayed the hallmarks of a promisingly complex thriller: an unusual plot line, an indiscernible meandering path of a plot, and cliffhangers that inspired a rounded ‘ooo’ at the end of each scene.

Told – or rather viewed – from the perspective of a number of individuals, including a camcorder wielding American tourist, a secret service bodyguard, the American President, a little girl, and a handful of other characters, the story centers on the monumental signing of a document that aims to end global terror.

However, without giving too much away, things do not go according to plan, and over a twenty-three minute period an assassination bid on the President unfolds.

As the film loops through this period and the perspective of each participant is exhibited, a new piece is added to the larger mystery with each loop.

For some, this incessant re-timing of the clock was frustrating; for me, it was fascinating…

…until the movie succumbed to what is now becoming a deeply wearisome format: evil Arab terrorists versus The Indestructible American Patriots.

I will concede, for a moment I was fooled into thinking that director, Pete Travis, was pursuing another angle: set in Salamanca, Spain, I hypothesised that the group could be Basque separatists.

Alas, I was proved wrong and compelled to sit through the propagandist gloop not by any desire to get my money’s worth, but rather due to the highly comedic turns by the type-cast characters.

Dennis Quaid, as the traumatised former Presidential bodyguard Agent Barnes, exhibits less range and depth of character than a cornflake.

In fact, to gain a thorough notion of his range, below is an image that – aside from the changing milieu – is largely how Quaid looks for the majority of the movie. Turn the picture sideways for his historical jump-to-save-the-Pres moment, or crop to just the head for the duration of his car journey, and you have every possible scene covered.

His fellow agent, Kent Taylor, played by Lost‘s Matthew Fox is equally drippy. For most of the film I was anticipating the stealthy appearance of a bedraggled Kate, her magnificent blue eyes wide as she gesticulated, “Where are you going, Jack? I’m going with you…”.

The appearance of French actor, Saïd Taghmaoui, prompted a brief moment of pleasant surprise – he of La Haine fame – a moment only to be followed by abject despair as he conformed to stereotype.

From the days of cinematic yore, the Arab has been characterised by a bizarre tick that shall henceforth be acknowledged as ‘crazy eyes’.

A look that can easily be replicated in front of the bathroom mirror, it involves a tense clenching of the jaws and a widening of the eyes, which then rotate slowly in whichever direction is necessary. This is usually accompanied by a dire accent, and much head-wobbling.

As Taghmaoui submitted to the stance with great gusto and the camera zoomed in from below, a cacophony of orchestra strummed up to intensify the menace, and I choked and hacked on my cheesy puff as my once favourite actor fell from grace.

Nevertheless, there was a redeeming feature - a saving grace, if you will - in the form of Forest Whitaker, as the benign, bumbling innocent abroad, Howard Lewis.

Whitaker was like an invigorated human-being amidst a sea of movable mannequins: as Taghmaoui gurned, Fox played Jack, and Quaid struggled with facial expressions, Whitaker was a sight to behold and made one long to furnish him with a hot water bottle and as many cups of tea and biscuits as is humanely possible.

In short, he was pretty darn marvellous.

The opposite of marvellous was the rest of the film.

For a start, the issue of language rendered me in a state of utter bewilderment: the Spanish spoke Spanish and viewers were duly supplied with subtitles; the Americans spoke English, except for when they were talking to the Arabs, in which case they spoke Spanish; the Arabs spoke and text each other in English, and then feigned muteness when with the Americans – possibly because the Americans insisted on practicing Espagnol 101 in their presence.

Secondly, we, the audience, never discover who or what the organisation is throughout the movie. According to brief snippets of ill-calculated nonsense compiled by the tea-boy on set, the group “is affiliated to the Mujaheddin in Afghanistan via Morocco and Beirut”.

It’s as though tea-boy just opened his Rough Guide to the Middle East and stuck three pins in the map while blind-folded.

Okay, okay, so it is just a movie, but would the actors turn into pillars of salt if an Arabic word or ten was spoken? And please, Hollywood, fork out on an advisory specialist on the region and its turmoil, because your blatant ignorance is killing us.

With laughter.

Lastly, the seeming indestructibility of Quaid’s tiny car – hijacked from a Spanish driver – holds a secret that I am positive James Bond is torturing out of a SEAT engineer as we speak, while his dry-cleaner must set his clothes with varnish to achieve that never-worn look, despite innumerable bombings, car wrecks, and shootings.

He really is the Teflon-man.

The bile-inducing ending nestles the cherry on top of the steaming turd, and as I wiped my tears of laughter from my eyes as we exited, I could not rejoice in the unanticipated comedy of the evening entirely, as the movie had started off absolutely brilliantly.

A novel concept, propaganda aside, Vantage Point is a good thriller. Or could have been.

Toot rating: 2/5

Yet a subtle revolution is taking place, as the graphic novel evolves into a varied tome that when compiled by an author of great skills, becomes a veritable treasure, providing a feast for the eyes and a quench to the sated imagination.

Through Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi has succeeded in breaking into new territory – the autobiographical graphic novel – with an ease that renders the reader with a desire to never again return to written-word publications.

The opening pages commence with an astute wit that continues relentlessly throughout the two volumes, though Satrapi’s ability to convey the tragedy, futility, hypocrisy and treachery of the Islamic Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War, and the protagonists therein remains astounding.

As ten-year-old Marjane moves through school, so too does society move from being a liberal state to one of intense religiosity.

Yet Persepolis is more than a mere charting of the Revolution, for Satrapi takes the reader beyond the images of Ayatollahs and ardent marches, and into the lounges of ordinary Iranians.

From covert parties to the clandestine trading of Michael Jackson and Kim Wilde cassettes, the finer details of every day life are shared with a nostalgia that does not omit the closeness of death.

As the Iran-Iraq War intensifies, the now teenage Marjane is sent by her parents to live in Austria with relatives.

Ostensibly sent to avoid the misery of war, the exile becomes an exhausting fight for survival and to assimilate with her new cohorts.

Cast out from the home of her relatives, Marjane moves from residence to residence, before finally plunging to a new nadir and returning to Iran.

Once more confronting the challenge of a new culture and society, Marjane strives to fit in with her old friends, while discovering that her European outlook cannot be reconciled with the seemingly liberal demeanour of her childhood friends.

From childhood to adulthood, Satrapi excels in charting her position as a child, a daughter, a woman, and a wife in a society that evolves at a rapid pace.

Demonstrating the ability to move deftly from mocking antics to abject loss within a few frames, the black-and-white cartooning proves that graphics can move a reader – or observer – as profoundly as words.

Available in one complete volume, or two separate – Persepolis 1: The Story of a Childhood, and Persepolis 2 – The Story of a Return – the novel provides a sumptuously witty affair that can be re-read, or dipped into in an increasingly addicted manner.

The Complete Persepolis is published by Pantheon, 352 pages, 2007. ISBN: 0375714839